crC.  ^/Putrv-e'  ^rf(&iA&n4 


IHY  AMERICANS 
DISLIKE  •*  •*  •*  •*  •*  «* 
ENGLAND  •*  •*  «*  •* 


BY  GEORGE  BURTON  ADAMS 

Professor  of  History  in  Yale  University  J*  &  <#  £ 


Philadelphia  j*  j*  **  j*  j* 

HENRY  ALTEMUS 


Copyrighted  by  Henry  Altetnus,  of  Philadelphia,  in  the  State  of  Pennsyl- 
vania, on  yuly  3,  i8qb,  in  the  One  Hundred  and  Twentieth  Year  of 
the  Independence  of  the  United  States  of  America. 


HENRY  MORSE  STEPHEN 


HENRY  ALTBMUS,  MANUFACTURER, 
PHILADELPHIA. 


WHY  AMERICANS  DISLIKE  ENGLAND* 

PRESIDENT  CLEVELAND'S  message  on  the 
Venezuelan  boundary  dispute  revealed,  like 
a  flash  light,  the  existence  of  a  widespread 
popular  dislike — it  would  hardly  be  too  strong  to  say 
hatred — of  England  in  this  country.  There  is  no 
other  country  in  the  world  against  which  there  could 
have  been  excited  by  a  similar  message  on  a  similar 
issue  so  sudden  and  apparently  universal  a  passion. 
Fortunately  the  reaction  came  almost  as  quickly,  and, 
while  it  revealed  the  existence  of  an  even  stronger 
public  opinion  against  war,  it  revealed  also  a  feeling 
of  love  for  England  and  a  recognition  of  the  essen- 
tial  unity  between  us.  Whether  the  feeling  of  hos- 
tility or  of  kinship  is  really  the  stronger  with  us,  no 
man  can  say  with  certainty.  But  it  must  be  regarded 
as  proved  beyond  all  doubt  that  there  is  in  the  minds 
of  a  large  proportion  of  our  people,  very  probably 
of  a  majority  of  them,  a  peculiar  feeling  of  dislike 
towards  England,  which  they  cherish  towards  no  other 
country,  and  a  peculiar  quickness  to  flame  up  into 
open  opposition  to  her  whenever  she  seems  to  be 

*This  essay  is  the  expansion  of  an  article  which  appeared  in 
the  New  York  Independent  of  January  2d,  1896,  and  some 
paragraphs  have  been  transferred  directly  from  that  article  with 
the  kind  permission  of  the  editor. 

(5) 


514878 


6  WHY   AMERICANS    DISLIKE    ENGLAND. 

threatening   the   slightest   encroachment    upon    our 
interests. 

It  is  foolish  to  attempt  to  deny  the  existence  of 
this  feeling,  as  some  have  done  since  the  advent  of 
a  calmer  mood.  There  are,  no  doubt,  some  parts  of 
the  land  in  which  it  is  less  strong  than  in  others,  and 
some  circles  in  whichA*iUis*  scarcely  felt  at  all.  There 
are  many  thousands  of  us  who  recognize  as  among 
the  strongest  of  ties-those  of  common  kiterest  and 
relationship  which  bin&^us  to  the  motherland.  But 
j  it  is  possible  to  find  in  every  part  of  the  country  and 
^  in  every  class  in  the  community  evidences  enough  of 
an  almost  inborn  dislike  of  England.  Men  of  the 
highest  intelligence,  of  the  widest  knowledge  of 
affairs,  of  the  most"  judicial  calmness,  of  cosmopoli- 
tan sympathies,  men  of  some  or  all  of  these  traits, 
may  be  found  in  numbers  who  are  profoundly  in 
earnest  in  believing  that  we  must  be  constantly  on 
our  guard  against  the  designs  of  England,  and  who 
hold  it  practically  certain,  though  they  would  regard 
a  war  with  England  as  the  greatest  of  misfortunes, 
that  such  a  war  is  inevitable  at  some  not  distant  date 
in  the  future.  These  men  are  no  doubt  a  small 
minority  only  of  their  class,  but  as  we  go  down 
towards  the  level  of  the  average  man,  we  may  easily 
make  sure  that  those  who  hold  such  opinions  rapidly 
increase  in  numbers,  and  the  fact  is  undeniable  that 
-4  the  mass  of  Americans  look  upon  England  alone 
among  all  the  nations  of  the  world  as  the  one  which 
is  naturally  unfriendly  to  us,  and  which  we  must 
always  regard  with  suspicion. 


WHY   AMERICANS    DISLIKE    ENGLAND.  7 

To  those  of  us  who  stop  to  consider  what  the  next 
century  is  likely  to  witness  in  the  history  of  the  world, 
these  feelings  seem  fraught  with  possibilities  of  the 
greatest  disaster  to  our  nation,  as  well  as  to  our  race, 
but  if  we  would  avoid  these  consequences,  the  first 
necessity  is  to  recognize  the  existence  and  to  find  out 
the  sources  of  the  feelings  which  would  lead  to  them. 

In  the  first  place,  and  lying  at  the  foundation  of  all 
else,  is  the  fact  that  for  more  than  a  hundred  years 
we  have  been  trained  in  this  feeling  by  an  almost 
uninterrupted  series  of  events.  We  may  date  the  be- 
ginning of  it,  for  the  present  purpose,  from  the  war  of 
the  Revolution,  though  its  roots  lie  much  further  back 
in  a  sense  of  injustice  which  had  long  been  growing, 
and  that,  too,  out  of  events  entirely  unconnected  with 
the  questions  of  taxation  which  led  to  the  Revolution. 

So  far  as  our  first  war  with  England  has  any  influ- 
ence upon  feeling  at  present,  it  is  of  the  old  sort. 
Americans  pay  far  less  attention  than  they  ought  to 
the  fact  that  English  people  now  nearly  all  regard  the 
cause  of  the  thirteen  colonies  as  that  of  Englishmen 
everywhere,  and  are  inclined  to  say — as  one  of  them 
did  to  me  not  long  ago — that  the  American  Revolu- 
tion brought  to  an  end  the  last  attempt  at  personal 
government  on  the  part  of  the  sovereign  in  violation 
of  the  spirit  of  the  English  constitution. 

The  feeling  which  the  Revolutionary  war  left  was 
deepened  by  the  retention  of  the  Western  posts,  and 
by  the  belief,  whether  right  or  wrong,  that  England 
was  plotting  to  turn  loose  upon  our  frontier  settlers 


8  WHY   AMERICANS   DISLIKE    ENGLAND. 

the  horrors  of  Indian  warfare.  Recent  careful  inves- 
tigations in  the  British  official  correspondence  of  the 
period,  preserved  in  the  Canadian  archives,  have 
shown  that  the  worst  of  the  charges,  made  at  the 
time  and  since,  were  unfounded,  but  that  still  there 
was  some  ground  for  the  suspicion  that  England  had 
other  motives  for  the  retention  of  the  posts  than 
those  which  she  stated  to  our  government,  and  that  very 
likely  she  intended,  in  the  event  of  another  war  with 
us,  to  make  sure  at  least  that  the  Indians  would  not  be 

^  among  her  enemies.  For  our  present  purpose,  how- 
ever, the  important  fact  is  that  these  horrible  charges 
against  England  were  implicitly  believed  a  hundred 
years  ago,  and  pas*sed  into  our  view  of  the  history  of 
the  period.  They  have  been  repeated  in  book  after 
book,  and  are  still  taught  and  believed,  though  with- 
\j  out  the  special  passion  which  they  once  aroused. 
They  stand  now  merely  as  a  part  of  the  general 
indictment. 

We  have  lately  celebrated,  with  general  approval, 
the  centennial  of  the  conclusion  of  Jay's  treaty,  which 
put  our  relations  with  England  on  a  better  footing 
than  before.  In  1795,  however,  the  conditions  of 
that  treaty,  though  they  were  in  general  acceptable 
to  the  commercial  interests  of  the  country,  seemed 
to  the  mass  of  the  people  to  surrender  far  more  than 
was  gained,  and  were  greeted  with  a  storm  of  popular 
indignation  which  in  several  places  resulted  in  mob 
violence.  This  feeling  affected  even  the  popularity 

y  of  Washington,  and  aided  in  the  overthrow  of  the 
Federalist  party.     The  advantages  which  the  treaty 


WHY   AMERICANS    DISLIKE    ENGLAND.  9 

secured  were  not  so  quickly  recognized,  and  its 
temporary  influence  was  to  keep  alive  the  bitterness 
and  hostility  which  the  Revolution  had  created. 

It  was  but  a  short  time  from  this  to  the  hostility 
which  was  created  by  the  English  misuse  of  the  right 
of  search,  by  the  impressment  of  American  seamen, 
and  by  the  violent  disregard  of  American  commer--* 
cial  rights,  followed  by  the  war  of  1812.  It  is  very 
true  that  "  the  war  of  1812  was  waged  by  one  free 
people  against  another  free  people  in  the  interest  of 
Napoleon,  the  real  enemy  of  them  both.  It  diverted 
England's  strength  at  a  time  when  it  was  sorely 
needed  in  Europe,  and  it  might  have  been  prevented 
at  any  time  before  1812  by  a  few  conciliatory  words 
followed  by  conciliatory  deeds."*  It  is  very  true 
also  that  England  regarded  the  war  as  a  mere  episode, 
of  the  larger  struggle,  and  that  Englishmen  hardly 
remember  it  now.  But  it  is  just  as  true,  on  the  other 
hand,  that  the  war  forms  another  stage  in  our  history 
of  continuous  disagreement  with  England,  and  ./ 
serves  to  confirm  the  belief  that  her  permanent  atti-  y, 
tude  towards  us  is  unfriendly.  Its  events  also  feed 
the  confidence  in  our  ability  to  give  the  mother  land 
the  sound  drubbing  it  is  thought  she  needs — a  confi- 
dence which  is  a  very  important  consideration  in  its 
bearing  on  our  attitude  towards  her. 

England  experienced  the  evil  results  of  her  misuse 
of  the  right  of  search  when  she  began  her  earnest 
efforts  to  suppress  the  slave  trade,  and,  however  much 

*Channing:  The  United  States  of  America.  1765-1865. 
p.  189. 


10  WHY   AMERICANS    DISLIKE    ENGLAND. 

Americans  may  have  sympathized  with  her  purpose, 
their  dislike  of  England  was  not  lessened  by  her 
efforts  to  carry  it  out.  The  various  boundary  dis- 
putes in  the  middle  of  the  century  served  to  keep  the 
feeling  alive,  and  if  the  "  baked  beans  "  or  "  Aroos- 
took  "  war  was  ridiculous,  there  was  some  spirit  be- 
hind it,  and  the  excitement  of  the  "  fifty-four  forty, 
or  fight"  period  was,  in  some  respects,  like  that 
which  followed  the  President's  Venezuelan  message. 

So  much  for  the  history  which  preceded  the  civil 
war.  What  has  been  here  said  on  the  facts  of  this 
period  must  not  be  understood  to  imply  that  Eng- 
land 's  action,  or  what  was  supposed  to  be 
England's  action,  in  these  cases,  still  rankles  in  our 
hearts,  and  contributes  directly  to  the  feeling  which 
so  many  now  cherish.  It  would  be  very  difficult,  I 
think,  to  find  a  man  who  now  cares  very  much  about 
any  of  these  things,  or  who  looks  at  any  of  them  in 
the  light  in  which  his  grandfather  regarded  them. 
If  there  were  nothing  more  than  this  to  be  said  of 
the  causes  of  the  attitude  of  the  majority  of  Ameri- 
cans towards  England,  there  would  be  nothing  to  be 
said.  There  would  be  no  active  feeling  of  dislike  to 
account  for. 

But  there  is  a  way  in  which  these  events  of  some- 
what ancient  history  do  have  an  important  bearing 
on  the  present  attitude  of  our  people.  They  lie,  as 
has  been  said  above,  at  the  foundation  of  all  the  rest. 
They  may  not  lead  any  one  now  to  an  actual  desire 
for  revenge,  but  they  have  created  a  hereditary  method 
of  judgment.  They  have  a  strong  influence  on  the 


WHY   AMERICANS   DISLIKE    ENGLAND.  II 

belief  that  England  is  always  our  enemy,  and  they 
are  the  material  out  of  which  the  traditional  feeling 
has  been  formed  that  we  must  always  look  upon  the 
designs  of  the  British  government  with  suspicion. 

This  feeling  has  lately  been  very  concisely  put  in  a 
public  address  by  Senator  Hawley  of  Connecticut, 
whose  words  are  better  evidence  on  this  point  than 
those  of  some  others,  because  he  can  hardly  be  classed 
among  the  blatant  and  demagogic  jingoes  who  de- 
claim for  popular  effect.  He  says  :  "  The  English 
people  are  a  very  good  people,  but  they  are  not  the 
British  government.  That  is  another  thing  ;  and  in 
every  emergency  with  which  the  United  States  has 
been  confronted,  the  British  government  has  been 
our  enemy. "  Now  whether  this  is  true  historically 
or  not  true — and  no  doubt  much  could  be  said  upon 
the  other  side — the  point  with  which  we  are  here 
concerned  is  that  it  is  popularly  believed.  It  repre- 
sents the  a  priori  attitude  of  the  average  American 
with  regard  to  every  question  which  concerns  our  re- 
lations with  Great  Britain.  For  this  condition  of 
mind  these  facts  of  our  past  history  are  mainly  re- 
sponsible. 

In  the  discussions  ,of  this  subject  which  have  re-  ^$ 
cently  taken  place,  many  writers  and  speakers  have 
been   disposed  to   lay  the  blame  for  the  continued    ' 
influence  of  these  historical  events  upon  the  teaching 
of  United  States   history  in  our  public  schools,  es- 
pecially upon  the  partial  presentation  of  the  facts  in 
the  text-books  in  use,  and  upon  the  attitude  of  the 
teacher  in  the  class-room.     Something  of  the  result, 


12  WHY    AMERICANS    DISLIKE    ENGLAND. 

which  the  public  schools  unquestionably  produce,  is 
very  probably  due  to  these  conditions.  Many 
school  histories  do  convey  wrong  impressions  to  the 
X  prejudice  of  England,  and  probably  no  one,  not 
even  the  very  best  yet  written,  has  told  the  whole 
truth  as  it  will  one  day  be  told.  But  if  we  will  look 
a  little  below  the  surface,  I  think  we  shall  see  at 
once  that  it  makes  comparatively  little  difference  in 
what  form  the  particular  text-book  in  use  presents  the 
facts.  Mr.  Goldwin  Smith  has  recently  pointed 
out  in  an  English  journal  that  some  of  our  most 
widely  used  school  histories  display  no  hostility  to 
England  in  their  forms  of  statement.  This  is  cer- 
tainly as  it  should  be,  and  it  is  to  be  hoped  that 
these  books  may  set  the  fashion  for  the  future.  But 
this  does  not  cover  the  whole  case.  It  is  not  possi- 
ble for  an  American  boy,  at  the  impressionable 
public  school  age,  to  read  the  bare  facts  of  the  Revo- 
lutionary war,  of  the  war  of  1812  and  its  prelude, 
and  of  our  civil  war,  without  a  feeling  that  England 
is  our  hereditary  enemy,  or  without  a  wish,  boy- 
fashion,  for  another  war  with  her  to  settle  old  scores. 
This  at  least  is  the  result  in  most  cases.  The  fact  is 
easy  enough  of  confirmation.  In  the  war  plays  of 
our  boys,  the  enemy's  army,  if  it  is  a  foreign  war,  is 
always  the  British  army.  I  was  greatly  amused  re- 
cently to  find,  in  the  course  of  some  inquiries  in  re- 
gard to  this  matter,  certain  small  but  violent  enemies 
of  England  in  the  family  of  a  friend  whose  own 
views  are  very  strongly  of  the  opposite  kind.  In 
many  such  cases  the  boyish  feeling  will  be  speedily 


WHY   AMERICANS    DISLIKE    ENGLAND.  13 

outgrown  when  a  more  reflective  study  of  our  history 
becomes  possible.     But  in  many  more  it  is  not  out- 
grown and  forms  a  strong  antecedent  prejudice  under  X 
the   influence   of  which   every   later   opinion   takes 
its  shape. 

The  attitude  of  the  teacher  in  the  class-room  is  of 
much  greater  importance  than  the  attitude  of  the  text- 
book. The  real  interpretation  of  the  facts  which 
the  child  carries  away  with  him  is  far  more  likely  to 
be  that  which  the  teacher  presents,  certainly  that 
which  the  skillful  teacher  presents,  than  that  of  the 
book.  Here  I  may  be  allowed,  perhaps,  to  point  out 
in  passing  that  no  class  among  us  possesses  a  better 
opportunity,  probably  none  so  good,  to  create  a  right 
feeling  towards  England  for  the  future  as  the  public 
school  teachers  of  the  'country.  This  cannot  be 
done  by  changing  the  facts  of  our  history.  It  is  to 
be  done  partly  by  putting  them  in  their  right  light, 
and  partly  by  showing  how  deeply  and  in  how  many 
ways  we  are  in  the  debt  of  England,  especially  for 
our  institutions,  and  how  greatly  she  is  like  us,  and 
how  many  interests  we  have  in  common. 

With  the  civil  war  period  of  our  history,  we  come 
to  facts  which  not  merely  serve  as  an  additional  count 
in  the  historical  indictment,  but  which  are  also  an 
active  cause  of  bitter  feeling  at  the  present  time; 
indeed,  the  attitude  of  England  during  that  struggle 
towards  the  government  of  the  North  has  far  more 
direct  influence  in  creating  a  feeling  of  dislike  to-  -v 
day  than  all  the  earlier  incidents  of  our  history  to- 


14  WHY   AMERICANS   DISLIKE    ENGLAND. 

••/  gather.  Thousands  of  men  who  can  forgive  everything 
else  cannot  forgive  that.  The  feeling  towards  the 
rebels  has  practically  disappeared,  even  that  towards 
the  "copperheads"  has  ceased  to  show  itself;  but 
one  can  hear  on  every  hand  still,  and  from  the  best 
of  men,  expression  of  the  old  feeling  in  regard  to 
England ;  many,  who  felt  it  strongly  at  the  time, 
hold  it  almost  or  quite  as  strongly  now,  and  it  has 
become  the  traditional  feeling  with  the  second 
generation. 

It  is  easy  enough  to  show  historically, — and  it 
ought  to  be  done  repeatedly, — that  only  a  small 
minority  of  the  people  of  England  were  hostile  to  the 
*  Union.  The  words  of  our  great  and  influential 
friends  in  that  country  we  cannot  read  even  after 
this  lapse  of  time  without  a  thrill  of  gratitude.  The 
noble  self-renunciation  of  the  suffering  cotton  oper- 
atives in  declaring  that  they  were  ready  to  starve 
rather  than  to  be  used  as  a  pretext  for  any  action 
which  would  lead  to  the  perpetuation  of  slavery,  we 
recognize  as  equal  in  its  spirit  to  any  act  of  our  own 
citizens.  But  notwithstanding  the  recognition  of 
these  facts,  the  majority  of  Americans  agree  with 
the  words  of  Senator  Hawley  just  quoted.  The 
J  English  people  may  be  our  very  good  friends,  but 
they  have  not  been  able  to  control  their  government, 
4  and  it  is  with  the  government  that  we  have  had  to 
reckon  and  shall  have  to  reckon  in  the  future. 

The  simple  fact  is  that  feeling  during  the  war  was 
so  intense  and  bitter — a  feeling  deepened  by  the  be- 
lief that  the  British  government,  out  of  dislike  or 


WHY    AMERICANS    DISLIKE    ENGLAND.  15 

hostility  towards  the  Union,  stood  ready  to  prove 
itself  untrue  to  all  its  professions  on  the  subject  of 
slavery — and  this  feeling  survives  still  in  the  breasts 
of  so  many  then  living  and  engaged  with  all  that 
they  held  dear  in  the  desperate  struggle,  and  has 
passed  as  an  immediate  and  living  belief  to  so  many 
of  their  children  that  no  amount  of  argument  will 
serve  to  destroy  it. 

Another  feeling  which  the  civil  war  period  pro- 
duced in  regard  to  our  foreign  relations  is  comple- 
mentary to  this  and  equally  significant.  The  events 
of  that  time  are  responsible  for  the  popular  belief 
that  Russia  is  our  only  firm  friend  among  the  Euro- 
pean nations,  and  that  in  any  future  contest  with 
England  she  is  our  natural  ally,  as  well  as  for  the 
further  belief  that  in  any  future  struggle  between 
Russia  and  England  our  natural  place  is  on  the  side 
of  Russia.  Whether  in  this  latter  case  the  feeling 
would  be  strong  enough  to  lead  to  any  direct  action 
may  be  doubtful,  but  that  it  is  cherished  by  a  con- 
siderable number  of  our  people  is  certain.  It  is 
merely  the  fact  that  during  the  time  of  our  supreme 
danger  Russia  was  the  only  great  Power  that  showed 
an  actively  friendly  disposition  towards  the  govern- 
ment of  the  North,  which  is  the  source  of  this 
feeling. 

It  would  have  been  just  as  easy,  it  would  indeed 
have  been  far  easier,  for  England  to  have  gained  this 
advantage  for  herself.  The  civil  war  offered  her  the 
opportunity  to  wipe  the  past  entirely  away,  and  to  se- 
cure the  most  cordial  friendship  and  support  of  the 


1 6  WHY   AMERICANS    DISLIKE    ENGLAND. 

American  people  for  all  the  future.  We  hardly  state 
the  case  too  strongly  when  we  assert  that  it  is  the 
X  greatest  mistake  of  England's  foreign  policy  during 
the  century  that  she  chose  to  do  the  opposite.  This 
is  certainly  true  if  the  not  distant  future  is  to  witness, 
as  many  signs  seem  to  indicate  that  it  will,  a  great 
struggle  of  races  for  the  virtual  control  of  the  world. 
If  such  a  struggle  should  come  on  in  any  form,  of 
physical  force  or  of  peaceful  competition,  the  best 
and  almost  the  only  hope  of  victory  for  the  scattered 
and  exposed  Anglo-Saxon  race  lies  in  the  cordial 

I  union  of  all   its  parts  in  support  of  their  common 

I  interests. 

If  the  mass  of  the  English  people  had  controlled 
the  foreign  policy  of  their  government  thirty  years 
ago,  this  mistake  would  not  have  been  committed. 
But  they  did  not,  and  the  small  minority  who  ruled 
England  then  were  actuated  partly,  in  all  probability, 
by  a  desire  to  see  the  Union  divided,  but  perhaps 
even  more  by  a  kind  of  hereditary  feeling  of  con- 
tempt for  Americans,  the  supercilious  air  of  superiority 
which  England  has  so  often  assumed  towards 
America,  and  certain  classes  of  Englishmen  towards 
Americans.  The  latest  writer  on  the  history  of  the 
United  States  has  referred  to  this  as  among  the  cir- 
cumstances which  aided  in  bringing  about  the  war 
of  1812.*  That  the  remembrance  of  such  things 
enters  as  a  frequent,  though  minor  element  on  our 
side,  into  the  popular  feeling  towards  England 
is  probably  true.  Mr.  James  Bryce,  indeed,  in  a 

*  Charming:    The  United  States  of  America,     p.  188. 


WHY   AMERICANS   DISLIKE   ENGLAND.  17 

recent  article,  disavows  this  attitude  for  the  English 
of  the  present  generation.  He  says:  "English 
travellers  and  writers  used  no  doubt  formerly  to 
'Assume  airs  of  supercilious  condescension  which 
must  have  been  offensive  to  Americans.  But  these 
airs  were  dropped  twenty  or  thirty  years  ago." 
Mr.  Bryce  is  hardly  correct  in  this  statement, 
if  numerous  stories  afloat  in  this  country  are  to 
be  trusted ;  indeed,  there  seems  to  be  something 
of  this  character  ineradicabiy  fixed  in  the  nature 
of  the  Englishman,  for  it  is  this  attitude  of  insular 
superiority  and  contempt  for  everything  foreign 
that  makes  the  British  traveller  most  cordially  de- 
tested everywhere  on  the  face  of  the  earth.  There 
has  been  certainly  a  great  change  in  this  regard  in 
the  last  thirty  years  so  far  as  America  is  concerned, 
but  fully  half  the  change  has  been  in  the  feelings  of 
Americans  about  these  British  weaknesses.  They  no 
longer  touch  us,  as  they  once  did,  on  a  sore  spot,  but 
rather  on  the  humorous  side,  and  would  scarcely  be 
worth  notice  in  this  connection  but  for  the  proba- 
bility of  their  influence  in  determining  England's 
position  in  the  civil  war  period,  and  for  complete- 
ness' sake,  since  it  is  likely  that  they  do  still  influence 
the  feeling  of  individuals. 

It  is  more  profitable  to  turn  to  another  of  the  com- 
plex causes  of  the  popular  feeling  towards  England, 
— the  belief  in  the  domineering  and  monopolizing 
character  of  England's  policy  everywhere  in  the 
world.  In  its  most  general  form,  as  it  is  held  by 

2 


l8  WHY   AMERICANS   DISLIKE    ENGLAND. 

the  majority  of  Americans,  this  belief  is  probably  the  | 
influence  which  has  more  to  do  than  all   others  in 
creating      the      current     prejudice.        England     is 
thoroughly  selfish.     She  stands  ready  to  take  every 
advantage,  with  no  scruples  of  conscience,  of  weaker 
races.     She  would  not  hesitate  to  destroy  the  indus- 
try  or  commerce  of  any  foreign   state  if  she  could 
profit  by  the  result.     She  is  trying  to  annex  every- 1 
thing  for  which  she  can  advance  a  plausible  pretext,! 
or,  in  a  somewhat  literal  sense  of  the  slang  phrase,/ 
she  4<  wants  the  earth,"  and  she  will  stick  at  nothing 
in  her  efforts  to  get  it.     This  is  the  sum  of  the   in-] 
dictment,  and  the  majority  of  Americans  believe  itJ 

The  history  of  the  last  two  hundred  years,  as  it  is 
interpreted  this  side  the  Atlantic,  goes  far  to  sustain 
this  belief.  But  more  important  as  immediate  causes 
of  it,  are  two  matters  in  which  most  Americans  have 
a  present  interest,  and  which  serve  at  least  to  keep 
the  feeling  alive. 

The  first  of  these  is  the  case  of  Ireland.  Of 
course,  I  leave  entirely  out  of  this  account  the  ille- 
gitimate influence  of  the  large  Irish  vote  upon  poli- 
ticians who  do  not  care  for  the  results  of  their  words 
or  acts  if  they  can  gain  a  present  success.  We  are 
concerned  here  not  with  an  artificial  jingo  sentiment 
which  may  be  manufactured  to  order  to  influence  an 
election,  but  with  the  real  sentiment  which  lies  back 
of  it,  and  which  alone  renders  such  abuses  possible. 
Entirely  independent  of  this  artificial  sentiment, 
there  is  a  large  and  legitimate  influence  of  the  Irish 
question  upon  the  general  current  of  our  feeling  in 


WHY   AMERICANS    DISLIKE    ENGLAND.  19 

regard  to  England.  This  is  partly  due  to  the  share 
which  numerous  Irishmen  and  men  of  Irish  descent, 
who  have  risen  to  great  and  deserved  influence  in  * 
hundreds  of  communities  throughout  the  country, 
have  had  in  shaping  public  opinion.  It  is  also  partly 
due  to  the  almost  universal  belief  in  this  country 
that  Ireland  has  been  very  unjustly  treated  by  Eng- 
land, and  is  so  still ;  for  Americans  find  it  very  hard 
to  understand  the  English  fear  of  Home  Rule.  They 
do  not  appreciate  the  grounds  of  the  conviction  that 
Home  Rule  would  bring  about  the  dissolution  of  the* 
Empire,  nor  the  failure  of  the  Englishman  to  under-  * 
stand  the  way  in  which  a  federal  system  of  govern- 
ment works  in  practice.  No  other  single  case  has 
has  had  anything  like  so  much  to  do  with  creating 
the  general  opinion  among  us  that  England  is  the  ^> 
oppressor  of  feeble  races,  as  her  conduct  in  Ireland. 

This  opinion  in  regard  to  the  general  character 
of  England's  policy  is  reinforced  by  other  recent 
cases,  like  that  of  the  treatment  of  Portugal  a  half 
dozen  years  ago,  and  it  will  be  often  found  cher- 
ished by  men  who  have  no  other  reason  to  give  you 
for  their  dislike  of  England. 

In  the  second  place,  the  teaching  of  the  protec- 
tionist party  has  had,  beyond  all  doubt,  a  very  de- 
cided influence  in  this  same  direction.  This  fact  is 
entirely  independent  of  the  question  whether  the 
protectionist  doctrine  is  right  or  wrong.  Orators 
and  newspapers  have  labored  to  teach  the  people  y 
that  England  is  the  decided  foe  of  our  industries, 
seeking  by  every  means,  open  and  secret,  to  destroy 


2O  WHY   AMERICANS    DISLIKE    ENGLAND. 

them,  and  with  no  slight  effect.  Any  one,  who  has 
not  taken  the  pains  to  examine  the  fact,  would  be 
greatly  surprised  at  the  number  of  persons  who  would 
be  very  angry  if  they  were  called  ignorant,  or  easily 
gulled,  who  nevertheless  implicitly  believe  in  the 
donations  of  gold  by  the  Cobden  Club  to  aid  in  the 
war  upon  American  manufactures.  The  circulation 
of  pamphlets  in  favor  of  free  trade,  bearing  the 
imprint  of  the  Cobden  Club,  whatever  good  it 
may  have  done  in  individual  cases,  has  probably  on 
the  whole  done  more  harm  than  good,  especially  in 
helping  to  sustain  the  belief  that  the  English  com- 
mercial classes  are  the  active  allies  of  our  own  free 
traders  in  their  supposed  war  on  American  manufac- 
tures. 

These  arguments  of  the  protectionist  orators  have 
a  double  interest  in  this  connection.  They  serve, 
unquestionably,  to  keep  alive  a  feeling  of  antipathy 
to  England  in  a  portion  of  the  nation  ;  but  on  the 
other  hand  they  draw  their  support  and  gain  their 
credence  from  the  previously  existing  common  judg- 
ment of  the  people  of  the  thoroughly  selfish  char- 
acter of  England's  general  policy.  It  is  merely  one 
way  in  which  this  opinion  manifests  itself,  though  it 
also  acts  in  a  reflex  way  to  keep  the  parent  feeling 
alive.* 

*It  is  interesting  to  notice  that  the  advocates  of  free  coinage 
of  silver  mnke  spasmodic  efforts  every  now  and  then  to  enlist 
the  same  belief  in  the  service  of  their  cause.  During  the 
present  writing,  I  have  had  sent  rne  a  copy  of  a  doggerel, 
•'  Song  for  Free  Silver  in  a  Free  Nation,"  to  be  sung  to  the 


WHY   AMERICANS    DISLIKE    ENGLAND.  21 

I  think  it  is  not  wrong  to  say  that  this  feeling  of 
opposition  to  what  is  thought  to  be  England's 
monopolizing  tendency  is  the  most  universally  cher- 
ished of  all  the  elements  which  go  to  make  up  the 
popular  dislike  which  is  felt  towards  her.  I  have 
been  surprised  to  see  the  forms  which  this  belief  has 
taken  in  the  case  of  men  who  have  had,  as  I  have 
said,  nothing  else  to  urge  against  her,  and  who 
might  have  been  expected,  from  their  position  and 
opportunities  for  information,  to  have  a  more  correct 
knowledge  of  the  policy  which  England  is  at  present 
really  following.  For  there  is  no  question  but  that  a 
distinction  should  be  made  between  the  present  and 
the  past  in  this  matter,  though  the  mass  of  Americans 
fail  to  make  it.  Those  who  are  endeavoring  to 
make  clear  to  us  the  methods  and  results  of  British 
rule  in  India  and  in  Egypt  are  doing  a  very  use- 
ful piece  of  work.  The  argument  that  many  of  the 
annexations  of  the  past  have  been  really  forced  upon 
the  Empire  has  very  little  weight  with  us,  though  it 

tune  of  Marching  Through  Georgia,  which  contains  the   fol- 
lowing : 

There's  a  conflict  with  Old  England,  boys,  again  on  Western 

shores, 

There's  a  battle  with  a  nation  that  our  fathers  fought  of  yore, 
And  we'll  sweep  her  and  her  Tories,  as  our  fathers  did  before, 
Off  the  land  bordered  easterly  by  Georgia. 

Ye  men  of  Northern  firmness  and  ye  men  of  Southern  fire, 
Ye  men  of  Western  daring — all  ye  Nation's  sons  and  sires, 
Let  us  once  again  teach  England  not  to  rouse  a  Nation's  ire, 
From  the  West  to  the  further  coast  of  Georgia. 


22  WHY   AMERICANS    DISLIKE    ENGLAND. 

is  certainly  true.  No  great  Empire  has  ever  existed 
which  has  not  been  compelled  to  follow  this  policy, 
and  in  the  case  of  the  Empire  \vhich  presents  the 
nearest  parallel  in  history  to  the  British  Empire,  the 
Roman,  it  was  because  of  its  inability  to  follow  this 
policy  any  further  that  it  was  in  the  end  overthrown. 
Nor  do  we  generally  make  the  distinction  which 
ought  to  be  clear  to  us,  between  the  passion  for 
expansion  in  the  colonies  themselves  and  that  in  the 
mother  country.  The  cases  which  illustrate  this  are, 
however,  numerous  enough  in  the  last  thirty  years. 
The  Fiji  Islands  and  New  Guinea  are  directly  to  the 
point,  and  the  cases  in  South  Africa  still  more  so, 
because  there  the  home  government  never  yielded  to 
the  pressure  of  the  colonies — unfortunately,  we  are 
tempted  to  say,  for  if  it  had,  the  dangers  which  now 
threaten  the  Anglo-Saxon  occupation  of  that  part  of 
the  world  would  never  have  arisen. 

But  these  considerations,  however  true  they  may 
\   be,  have  as  yet  but  little  weight  with  us,  and,  as  has 
j !  been  said,  it  is  this  belief  in  England's  thorough  sel- 
I  fishness  that  has  more  to  do  than  all  else  with  sustain- 
i  ing  the  popular  judgment  behind  the  policy  which 
passes  to-day  as  the  Monroe  Doctrine,  and  it  largely 
.  explains  why  we  seem  to  have  one  doctrine  for  Eng- 
land and  another  for  other  nations.     There  is  a  fixed 
.determination  in  the  will  of  the  people  of  this  country 
•ahat  on  the  American  continents  this  selfish  policy  of 
England  shall  find  no  field  for  its  exercise.     If  the 
premises  on  which  this  judgment  rests  were  correct, 


WHY   AMERICANS    DISLIKE    ENGLAND.  23 

there  is  no  one  who  would  not  be  ready  to  defend 
the  conclusion  with  all  his  might. 

There  is  another  tendency  among  us  in  recent 
times  which  must  be  noticed  because  it  is  directly  con- 
nected with  this  last,  and  has  much  to  do,  though  as 
yet  unconsciously,  with  the  influence  which  the  feeling 
just  spoken  of  is  likely  to  have  on  our  future  action. 

No  one  can  have  watched  carefully  the  currents  of 
popular  sentiment  among  us  for  the  past  quarter  of  a 
century  without  being  aware  that  there  is  a  steadily 
growing  interest  on  the  part  of  the  mass  of  Ameri- 
cans in  questions  of  foreign  affairs,  not  merely  our 
own,  but  those  of  other  people,  and  that  there  is  with 
this  an  increasing  tendency  to  believe  that  we  have 
a  right,  and  that,  in  certain  contingencies,  we  ought 
to  interfere  in  affairs  that  are  not  primarily  our  own. 
Samoa  and  Hawaii,  Armenia  and  Cuba — and  these 
are  not  the  only  cases — have  not  claimed  so  much  of 
the  public  attention  merely  because  of  the  claptrap 
of  jingo  politicians,  however  much  of  this  there  may 
have  been  about  the  actual  steps  taken.  They  have 
had  behind  them  all  a  common  sentiment  and  a  real 
public  feeling  which  rendered  possible  the  noise  of 
the  jingoes,  and  they  are  signs  of  a  current  which  is 
beginning  to  run  steadily  in  our  national  life.  If  we 
analyze  these  cases  we  can  find  easily  what  this  com- 
mon sentiment  is.  It  is  the  feeling  that  justice  ought 
to  be  done,  that  the  weak  should  be  protected,  that 
there  should  be  somewhere  in  the  world  a  nation  able 
and  willing  to  call  the  oppressor  to  a  halt  in  the  selfish 
encroachments  on  the  rights  of  others  which  his 


24  WHY   AMERICANS    DISLIKE    ENGLAND. 

power  allows  him,  and  finally  that  the  United  States 
is  of  all  nations  called  to  this  mission.  This  feeling 
may  be  as  yet  half  unconscious,  it  may  be  ignorant 
and  often  mistaken  in  its  facts,  and  subject  to  great 
abuse  by  the  designing  politician  and  trader,  but  it 
would  be  a  great  mistake  not  to  see  that  it  has  begun 
to  form,  and  that  it  is  sure  to  grow.  It  is  in  the  main 
a  right  sentiment  and  its  influence  is  likely  to  be  for 
the  good  of  the  world,  where  the  facts  are  rightly 
understood.  If  it  is  easily  misled  as  to  the  facts, 
there  is  all  the  more  necessity  that  the  real  conditions 
of  every  case  should  be  clearly  and  fully  set  forth  by 
those  who  know  them.  However  this  may  be,  it 
seems  to  me  clear  that  this  sentiment,  whether  well 
instructed  or  ignorant,  is  going  to  have  an  increasing 
^influence  on  our  foreign  policy  in  the  future,  and  that 
it  must  be  reckoned  with  by  any  nation  which  is 
immediately  interested  in  that  policy. 

Its  bearing  on  the  present  subject  is  direct.  Here 
is  the  root  of  the  most  living  and  active  of  all  the 
elements  which  go  to  create  the  suspicion  which  is 
popularly  entertained  of  England's  intentions.  Could 
the  mass  of  Americans  be  convinced  that  England's 
policy  is  the  reverse  of  selfish,  that  she  is  as  willing 
to  be  fair  and  just  as  we  fondly  imagine  we  are  our- 
selves, that  she  is  ready  to  assist  in  protecting  the 
weak,  and  that,  so  far  from  being  an  oppressor,  she 
is  willing  to  aid  in  bringing  the  oppression  of  others 
to  an  end,  could  Americans  be  convinced  of  these 
things,  there  would  be  a  far  stronger  tide  of  popular 
feeling  in  her  favor  and  towards  active  friendship 


WHY   AMERICANS   DISLIKE    ENGLAND.  25 

i 

with  her  than  there  is  at  present.     Nor  would  the 
work  of  conviction  be  a  difficult  one.* 

Here,  then,  is  the  conclusion  of  the  matter. 

In  the  first  place,  our  people  have  behind  them  a 
hundred  years  of  training  by  the  uninterrupted  facts 
of  our  experience  in  a  certain  habit  of  judgment  in 
regard  to  England's  attitude  towards  us.  It  has  be- 
come, we  may  say,  a  kind  of  hereditary  tendency. 
This  is  the  interpretation  of  things  which  is  presented 
to  the  schoolboy  when  he  gets  his  first  impressions  of 
our  history,  and  the  citizen,  in  the  majority  of  cases, 
begins  to  form  his  opinions  on  public  questions  with 

*  In  this  connection  the  following  quotation  is  interesting.  It 
is  from  a  distinguished  English  wriier  on  colonial  subjects,  who 
is  disposed  to  criticise  the  tendency  which  he  believes  to  exist 
among  his  countrymen.  • 

"  In  England  the  present  age  is  one  in  which  the  spirit  of 
humanity  is  carried  almost  to  an  extreme.  Generous  sympathy 
with  weakness  and  suffering  in  any  form  goes  out  so  far  that  it 
is  almost  considered  a  virtue  to  be  weak  and  a  crime  to  be 
strong.  Whenever  there  is  a  point  at  issue  between  a  small 
community  and  a  great  one,  it  seems  to  be  assumed  that  the 
latter  must  be  in  the  wrong;  and,  as  their  own  nation  is. strong, 
Englishmen  are  inclined  to  take  it  for  granted,  that,  whenever 
friction  arises  between  Great  Britain  and  a  small  foreign  power 
or  between  the  mother  country  and  one  of  her  colonies  or 
dependencies,  the  fault  must  be  on  the  side  of  the  British  gov- 
ernment. They  do  not  consider  that  strength  in  a  race  or  nation 
implies  merit,  physical,  moral,  or  intellectual;  and  that  a  mode 
of  reasoning  which  invariably  condemns  the  stronger  party, 
may  be  generous,  but  is  certainly  untrue  alike  to  history  and  to 
common  sense." — C.  P.  Lucas  :  Introduction  to  Lewis's  Essay 
on  the  Government  of  Dependencies,  p.  xxxviii. 


26  WHY   AMERICANS   DISLIKE    ENGLAND. 

a  natural  bias  of  this  sort.  In  the  second  place,  this 
antecedent  prejudice  is  reinforced  and  in  many  cases 
turned  into  a  positive  belief  by  certain  present  causes, 
partly  acts  or  supposed  acts  of  England  or  the  gen- 
eral idea  entertained  of  her  policy,  and  partly  acts 
of  our  own  politicians. 

The  result  'is  two  fold. 

There  is  on  the  part  of  many  a  positive  dislike  of 
England,  a  readiness  to  accept  the  worst  interpreta- 
tion of  any  act  of  hers,  a  belief  that  she  is  particu- 
larly our  enemy  and  would  do  anything  that  she 
could  to  embarass  or  injure  us,  and  consequently 
a  readiness  to  break  out  into  open  hostility  whenever 
she  seems  inclined  to  encroach  upon  our  interests 
even  in  the  slightest  way.  On  the  part  of  many 
more,  probably  a  much  larger  number,  who  do  not 
feel  this  positive  dislike  or  actual  hostility,  there 
is  still  a  feeling  of  suspicion,  a  conviction  that  Eng- 
land is  capable  of  much  evil,  that  she  is  not  kindly 
disposed  towards  us,  and  that  she  must  be  carefully 
watched.  This  is  a  kind  of  latent  feeling,  which  might 
not  have  much  influence  in  beginning  a  quarrel,  but 
which  could  be  easily  swept  over  into  active  hostility 
after  a  disagreement  had  begun. 

In  a  general  conclusion  the  other  side  must  not  be 
overlooked.  There  is  certainly  on  the  part  of  many 
a  very  strong  liking  for  England,  a  real  feeling  of 
the  tie  of  kinship,  and  a  more  just  recognition  of  the 
true  identity  of  interest  between  the  two  halves 
of  the  Anglo-Saxon  race.  This  feeling  is  undoubt- 
edly stronger  in  the  East  than  in  the  West,  and 


WHY   AMERICANS    DISLIKE    ENGLAND.  27 

is  perhaps  strongest  within  the  limits  of  the  original 
thirteen  colonies.  It  is  certainly  an  especially 
strong  feeling  with  many  who  are  proud  of  their 
colonial  descent.  It  is  to  be  found  everywhere,  how- 
ever, among  the  more  intelligent  and  educated  classes 
of  the  nation,  and  it  is  happily  an  increasing  feeling. 

This  is  reinforced  by  the  opinion  of  the  com- 
mercial classes  of  the  large  cities — an  opinion 
which  had  much  to  do  with  the  reaction  which  fol- 
lowed so  quickly  upon  the  first  emotion  excited  by 
President  Cleveland's  message.  This  opinion  is  no 
doubt  somewhat  determined  by  the  interests  of  the 
individuals  which  make  up  the  class,  but  it  is  also 
true  that  they  are  in  a  position  to  realize  most 
clearly  the  conditions  of  essential  unity  in  the  race. 

If  one  asks  which  of  these  two  tendencies  is  the 
stronger,  the  answer  must  be,  as  was  said  at  the  out- 
set, that  no  one  can  tell.  The  probability  is, 
however,  that  the  feeling  of  dislike  is  still  the 
stronger,  that  the  friends  of  England  are  still  in  the 
minority,  and,  though  they  may  be  relatively  stronger 
than  at  the  beginning  of  the  war  of  1812,  that  the 
conditions  of  that  war  would  be  virtually  repeated  in 
the  isolation  and  powerlessness  of  this  class,  if  hostili- 
ties should  every  begin  again  between  the  two  coun- 
tries. That  this  is  probably  the  case  is  indicated  by 
the  fact  that  a  very  considerable  number  of  persons 
can  be  found,  belonging  to  the  classes  in  which  the 
feeling  is  most  favorable  to  England,  who  argue  with 
some  skill  and  often  with  much  vehemence  in  support 
of  the  popular  view  in  regard  to  England. 


j 


28  WHY   AMERICANS    DISLIKE    ENGLAND. 

The   practical    conclusion    is   that  the   prevailing 
feeling  in  this  country  is  still  unfavorable  to  England, 
and   she   must    take   the   fact    into   account   in    her 
reckonings.     If  she  counts  upon  a  sense  of  race  rela- 
tionship and  kinship,  a  kind  of  mother-and-daughter 
,  feeling,  she  is  counting  upon  something  which  exists 
^  in  thousands  of  individual  cases,  but  which  does  not 
exist  as  a  general  public  feeling,  and  which  would 
have  scarcely  an  appreciable  influence  in  determining 
our  action  in  times  of  great  excitement. 

The  attempt  has  been  made  in  this  essay  to  show 
that  the  common  feeling  in  this  country  towards 
England  has  a  foundation  in  our  past  history  and  in 
active  contemporary  causes,  but  it  is  hardly  possible 
that  any  one,  who  can  think  clearly  and  who  will  look 
out  calmly  upon  the  probable  future  of  the  world, 
can  avoid  the  belief  that  it  is  in  the  main  a  really 
mistaken  feeling,  and  that  it  is  in  every  regard  to 
be  deplored. 

Some  of  the  consequences  to  which  it  might  easily 
lead  us  are  horrible  to  contemplate.  Here  are  two 
of  them  which  have  recently  been  discussed  as  cer- 
tainties in  case  of  a  war  with  England.  The  first  is 
the  adoption,  as  our  chief  reliance  in  such  a  war,  of 
a  means  of  injuring  enemies  which  nearly  all  civil- 
ized nations  agreed,  forty  years  ago,  to  abandon  as 
too  barbarous  for  longer  use — that  is,  privateering,  or 
legalized  piracy.  The  second  is  an  alliance  with 
Russia  in  a  common  war  upon  the  British  Empire. 
This  means  an  alliance  with  the  one  most  dangerous 


WHY    AMERICANS    DISLIKE    ENGLAND.  29 

Power  which  represents  everything,  and  which  is 
most  zealously  engaged  in  spreading  everything,  in 
government  and  civilization  to  which  we  are  firmly 
opposed — an  alliance  to  make  war  upon  the  Power 
which  is  most  actively  engaged  in  every  quarter  of 
the  globe  in  advancing  the  ideas  in  which  we  our- 
selves thoroughly  believe. 

For  we  ought  to  remember  that  England  stands 
for  the  same  things  throughout  the  world  for  which 
we  stand.  Her  faults  are  great  and  not  to  be  de- 
nied ;  but  we  should  not  forget  that  they  are  our 
faults  as  well.  She  may  be  arrogant  and  overbearing ; 
but  we  have  not  to  go  so  very  far  back  in  our  history 
to  find  the  same  traits  displayed  in  our  own  public 
utterances.  She  may  have  borne  hard  upon  barba- 
rous races  under  her  rule ;  but  what  have  we  to  say 
of  our  own  Indian  policy?  She  may  browbeat 
weaker  nations  and  may  be  greedy  of  land  ;  but  with 
the  crime  of  the  Mexican  war  to  our  account,  we 
have  not  many  stones  to  throw  at  England.  These 
very  faults  carry  with  them  the  proof  of  our  kinship, 
and,  when  all  is  said,  England  stands  for  far  more 
of  the  things  that  we  believe  to  be  of  the  highest 
good  for  men,  for  far  more  of  the  things  on  which  we 
pride  ourselves,  than  does  any  other  nation  in  the 
world.  If  we  wish  to  make  these  things  prevail  in 
the  world  and  to  give  men  liberty  and  justice  and 
the  power  to  rule  themselves,  our  place  is  on  the  side 
of  England.  If  we  wish  to  do  our  best  to  help  des- 
potism to  prevail  and  to  turn  men  back  from  the  goal 
which  they  are  even  now  nearing  to  struggle  through 


30  WHY    AMERICANS    DISLIKE    ENGLAND. 

another  eighteenth  century  of  darkness  and  revolutions 
to  come  up  to  it  again,  then  we  ought  to  be  on  the  side 
of  Russia  to  help  her  destroy  the  British  Empire. 

And  now  I  may  be  pardoned,  perhaps,  a  word  to 
the  other  side. 

Very  many  among  us  recognize  the  incompleteness 
and  the  mistaken  grounds  of  the  popular  indictment 
of  England,  and  feel  strongly  on  the  other  hand  the 
bonds  of  common  interest  between  us.  Some  of  us 
consider  it,  too,  almost  as  great  a  misfortune  that  we 
should  have  been  taught  by  events  to  believe  Russia 
our  natural  ally,  as  that  we  should  learn  to  look  upon 
England  as  our  hereditary  enemy.  But  however  true 
it  may  be  that  the  popular  feeling  towards  England 
is  to  be  deplored,  it  is  nevertheless  a  fact,  and  it  can- 
not easily  be  changed.  The  voice  of  moderation 
may  make  itself  heard  in  crises  like  that  through 
which  we  have  just  passed  with  good  effect,  but  the 
feeling  will  remain  and  argument  can  do  but  little  to 
modify  it.  The  responsibility  for  bringing  about  a 
change  must  rest  very  largely  with  England.  All 
that  could  be  done  in  this  country  taken  together 
would  have  far  less  influence  in  this  direction  than  a 
single  clear  and  unmistakable  act  to  show  that  Eng- 
land, not  the  English  people,  but  the  British  govern- 
ment as  well,  regards  the  United  States  as  its  nearest 
friend,  and  is  disposed  to  consider  our  interests  its 
own.  It  might  very  easily  have  done  this  during 
our  civil  war,  as  has  been  said  ;  opportunities  to  do 
it  will  not  be  wanting  in  the  future. 


WHY    AMERICANS    DISLIKE    ENGLAND.  3! 

It  can  hardly  be  doubted  that  it  is  altogether  worth 
the  while  of  the  British  government  to  do  this.  As 
we  look  forward  to  the  next  century,  it  seems  the 
height  of  folly  for  England  to  face  the  new  diffi- 
culties and  far-reaching  changes  which  are  coming 
on,  with  this  great  chasm  in  the  Anglo-Saxon  world 
unclosed,  when  it  would  be  such  a  simple  matter  for 
her  to  close  it  'completely.  The  way  is  largely  pre- 
pared in  advance.  The  events  of  the  past  winter 
will  themselves  serve  as  a  preparation,  and  it  is  not 
unlikely  that  the  response  to  any  such  action  of  Eng- 
land would  surprise  us  all. 

As  for  ourselves,  in  the  narrower  sense,  it  is  no 
doubt  true  that,  in  iny  possible  future,  our  position 
is  far  more  secure  than  that  of  England,  and  yet  it  is 
certain  that  our  own  best  and  highest  interests,  jind 
those  of  all  men  ^verywnerej  demand  the  ui)ity*anS 
common  action  of  the  Anglo-Saxon  race.  ^ 


14  DAY  USE 

RETURN  TO  DESK  FROM  WHICH  BORROWED 
LOAN  DEPT. 

This  book  is  due  on  the  last  date  stamped  below,  or 

on  the  date  to  which  renewed. 
Renewed  books  are  subject  to  immediate  recall. 


100EC58AB 


REC'D  LD 


REC'D  LD 


OCTlbra-lPM 


PEC  ll  1958 


REC'D  LC 


UBBTings 


REC'D  LD 


N?5'65-T 


IN  STACKS 


SEP  2  3  1963 


LD  21A-50m-9,'58 


Genera' 


514878 
. 


UNIVERSITY  OF  CALIFORNIA  LIBRARY 


